Feeding in "Aplysia" provides an amenable model system for analyzing the neuronal substrates of motivated behavior and its adaptability by associative reward learning and neuromodulation. Among such learning processes, appetitive operant conditioning that leads to a compulsive-like expression of feeding actions is known to be associated…

Presents two studies which investigated the effects of social stimulation on infant's vocalization rates. Experiment I focused on response-contingent and response-independent social stimulation. Experiment II focused on continuous or omitted social stimulation. In both studies, social stimulation increased vocalization and the rate of responding…

In a recently developed in vitro analog of appetitive classical conditioning of feeding in "Aplysia," the unconditioned stimulus (US) was electrical stimulation of the esophageal nerve (En). This nerve is rich in dopamine (DA)-containing processes, which suggests that DA mediates reinforcement during appetitive conditioning. To test this…

Feeding behavior of Aplysia provides an excellent model system for analyzing and comparing mechanisms underlying appetitive classical conditioning and reward operant conditioning. Behavioral protocols have been developed for both forms of associative learning, both of which increase the occurrence of biting following training. Because the neural…

This research project was designed to explore suitable operant methods to assure successful acquisition of some initial formal reading skills by first and second graders. The subjects were 12 pupils diagnosed as predicted reading failures by failing scores on four or more subtests of a 10 test battery suggested by DeHirsch, Jansky, and Langford…

Results indicated that verb emission increased significantly across time for experimental group subjects as compared with control groups subjects when the operant level procedure was omitted. (Author)